Page 66 of The Book That Held Her Heart

Rather than repeat her question, Anne stood silently and waited, trying not to see the dead, or track the agonizing progress of the young officer as he painted a broad blood-trail towards the main doors.

Yute went to the black pool that had been the Escape. “I don’t suppose either of you have a needle?”

Anne shook her head. Kerrol snorted.

With a shudder, Yute picked up a shard of splintered wood and, trembling, jabbed it into the pad of his index finger. He held his hand out over the pool and let a drop of his curious blood fall into it. Another followed, and another.

The pool, so black as to have resembled a well filled with darkness, shimmered into life, glowing from within.

“It’s a doorway,” Yute said. “I think perhaps we should be talking to those who disagree with us rather than hunting for some solution to them and their ideas. Coming here was a mistake.”

Kerrol grunted and limped across to join him. “I rather liked the place while I could speak to people. The bookshops and their owners…” He looked towards the windows. A fire glow lit the sky to the east. “I wish we could save them.”

“I’m surprised we saved ourselves,” Yute said. “Well, we didn’t, did we?” He reached down to ruffle the fur of the cat-monster currently butting its head against his legs. “Wentworth did that. And it’s not the first time I’ve owed my life to his intervention.”

Kerrol beckoned Anne. “You need to come with us.”

Anne backed away. “They said I could go.”

“That was before”—Yute swept an arm at the carnage—“this.”

“This whole town, and who knows how far beyond, was on a knife’s edge, and tonight was the cut. A night of broken glass,” Kerrol said seriously. “There’s something burrowing into the minds of these people. They’ve tasted blood now. It will get worse, not better.”

Anne knew he was right. Both of them understood her world in a way that she did not, despite seeming to have arrived around lunchtime. But she also understood it in ways that they didn’t. Parts of it at least. She wanted to leave. A year earlier she might have knocked her own brother down to get to the exit that Yute appeared to have made. To see new worlds, filled with different possibilities, to share the wonders that had brought Yute and Kerrol to her doorstep.

“Come with us.” Yute reached out a hand, an urgency in his voice she’d not heard before, a pleading almost.

“I belong here.”

“What would your father—”

“Don’t.” Yute cut across Kerrol. “It should be her choice. Don’t manipulate her.”

“What are rational arguments if not manipulation?” Kerrol growled.

“Playing her emotions is not the same, and you know it.”

Part of Anne wanted to ask what it was that Kerrol knew about her father. She took another two steps back. “I have to go. This is my place. I can’t run away.” She turned and hurried to the corridor at the rear before pausing and looking back. Both Yute and Kerrol were watching her from the edge of the glowing pool. “Thank you. Thank you both. Whatever happens, I’ll never see the world the same again.” And without giving them a chance to reply, she ran.

To gain the full measure of any city in a single day simply start with one of its libraries, move on to a market or cathedral, either works equally well, and let the evening find you a tavern, public house, or speakeasy. By the second day the streets will hold little that surprises you.

The Traveller’s Guide to Krathe, by Mallory Schultz

Chapter 29

Evar

Starval pushed through the tavern doorway. Evar hesitated for a moment, eyeing the street. It felt as if every shadow looming in the mist might be someone he knew, Mayland, Arpix, Clovis…even Livira. The damp air muffled smells as readily as sounds, but for a moment it almost seemed he’d caught her scent.

“Come on!” Starval leaned back out and dragged him in. “They have food!”

The tavern’s interior was warm, lantern lit, and crowded. To Evar’s surprise, the place was mixed. Canith drank and ate alongside humans. Even some of the groups at the tables were mixed, canith dwarfing their fellow drinkers.

“This is like the poisoned city.” Evar shuddered at the memory. “The city you and Mayland— Tell me you didn’t know they were going to die.”

Starval frowned and twisted his mouth. “I have…regrets.”

Evar had expected a denial. One that he wouldn’t be able to identify as a lie. “Brother! A city…a whole city.”

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